Manage your subscription

Ivory torched for Elephant Day

27 July 1991

Kenya celebrated ‘Elephant Day’ last week by incinerating 6.8 tonnes
of ivory in a ritual burning. Katana Ngana, Kenya’s minister for wildlife
and tourism, visited Nairobi National Park to set the bonfire alight. Elephant
Day commemorates the occasion on 18 July two years ago when the Kenyan government
demonstrated its opposition to poaching by burning 12 tonnes of ivory.

Sally Nicholson of the World Wide Fund for Nature said that the ritual
burning of ivory is a good reminder for everybody that the war against poaching
must continue. ‘Kenya is claiming that the level of poaching has fallen
dramatically, and this ritual burning helps to reiterate the country’s determination
to wipe it out altogether,’ she said.

Nicholson said that there have also been public burnings in Taiwan,
of rhino horn as well as ivory but these have not attracted as much attention
as Kenya’s bonfires.